


serve my sentence

by emrys (livingshitpost)



Category: Sally Face (Video Games)
Genre: (13 if you count terrence but he was already kinda dead), Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Canon Compliant, Canonical Character Death, Capital Punishment, Character Death, Character Turned Into a Ghost, Dialogue Heavy, Drug Use, Dubious Morality, Execution, Gen, Headcanon, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, Marijuana, Mild Gore, Missing Scene, Moral Ambiguity, Moral Dilemmas, Morality, Morally Ambiguous Character, Not Beta Read, Past Character Death, Past Drug Use, Recreational Drug Use, Suicide, Underage Drug Use, Unsanitary, listen. he killed 12 people., sal and larry talk about what dying is like
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-08
Updated: 2019-02-08
Packaged: 2019-10-24 01:18:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,146
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17694845
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/livingshitpost/pseuds/emrys
Summary: The words from earlier that day rang in his head.Capital punishment.Dread curled in his stomach as the fact finally settled in.He was sentenced to death.





	serve my sentence

Sal lay on the cot in his cell, staring at the ceiling. He fiddled with his prosthetic eye absently. The words from earlier that day rang in his head.  _Capital punishment._ Dread curled in his stomach as the fact finally settled in; he was sentenced to death.

He sighed. "Hey," he said, his voice so quiet he almost couldn't hear himself. "Larry, are you there?"

There was an eerie shrieking sound as Larry appeared, leaning against the concrete wall. "Yeah. Don't exactly have a whole lot else to do." He gave an odd sort of half-smile.

Sal ran a hand down his face. "I'm gonna assume you heard the verdict?"

Larry's face fell. "Yeah. I heard." He sat on the cot and toyed with a frayed thread in one of the holes of his jeans. "You doin' okay?"

Sal shrugged. "I guess."

"Sal, don't bullshit me."

No response.

Larry leaned his elbows on his knees. "It's not so bad, y'know? I mean, it wasn't for me, anyway."

"You overdosed on heroin. I'm goin' in the fuckin' chair. It's not the same thing."

"Yeah, I know."

"I deserve it."

"No, you don't."

"I killed twelve fuckin' people, Lar." He sat up, almost glaring. "My dad. Your mom. Janis and Ray. Mrs. Gibson, David, Robert, CJ, Sierra, Azaria, Chug-" he stopped suddenly to wipe angry tears from his eyes. "Even baby Sodapop. And that's not even counting Mr. Packerton and Terrence."

"Terrence was, like, hundreds of years old," Larry reasoned. "He was basically already dead. And  _I'm_ the one who pulled the plug on Packerton, which he  _asked_ us to do."

"I know, I know. But still. It leaves a bad taste in my mouth."

"That might be because you're not brushing your teeth."

Though Sal's laugh was forced, he couldn't help but smile. "Good point."

"Of course it is. I'm a fuckin' genius."

"Oh, yeah. So much of a genius you drank bong water."

"I was sixteen, don't bully me."

"And you were seventeen, and seventeen and a half-"

"Okay, I get it."

"And eighteen, and twenty-one-"

"I said I get it!" Larry went to smack his friend. His hand didn't make contact, of course, but Sal held his arms up in mock defence and laughed along all the same. They kept laughing for a little while before coming down from the high.

"Sally?"

"Yeah, Larry?"

"I'm sorry you gotta die."

"Yeah. Me too."

"Hopefully Rose'll do whatever she did when I died and you'll be able to leave the execution chamber, y'know?"

"Yeah, maybe. I don't really wanna be stuck in there with a bunch of other dead convicts."

"But if you are, I'll stay in there with you and keep you company. We'll still hang out."

Sal smiled slightly. "Thanks, Lar."

"'Course. Ash won't talk to me, and Todd's fuckin' batshit, so you're pretty much all I've got."

"Good to know I'm your last resort."

"You _did_  kill twelve people, I think it's justified."

"You're an asshole."

"You're an idiot."

" _You're_ an idiot."

"You're  _short_."

"Hey!"

"You needed a _booster seat_ while you were on trial for  _mass_ _murder_."

"I did not! And even if I did,  _y_ _ou_ routinely hit your head on doors."

"I'm perfectly average height, thank you very much."

Sal leaned his back against the wall. "You keep telling yourself that."

"I will, thanks." Larry crossed his arms across his chest and looked down his nose at his friend, who couldn't help but laugh. He tried to stifle his own giggles before joining in. His grin faltered after a minute or so.

"You know I'm joking when I talk about how you killed everyone, right?"

"What d'you mean?"

"I mean- I mean I don't really  _blame_ you, y'know? Rose was tellin' me the same stuff. How everyone in the apartments was already corrupted by the Endless One, and they couldn't be saved . . . They were all covered in this gunky black shit, too. None of them would respond to anything I said or did."

Sal sighed. "I just wish there'd been another way."

"I know. But I'm with Ash, actually."

"She testified against me, dude."

"You know what I mean. You're not an evil man."

"Well, I sure as hell feel like one."

"If you were evil, you wouldn't feel like shit over killing people, and you certainly wouldn't've let the cops get you."

"If I were good, I wouldn't've killed anyone in the first place."

"But you only did it to protect everyone else. To protect the  _world_ from that plague of shadows my dad was talking about in his journal."

"You read his journal?"

"Yeah. It was when we had that horror marathon, remember? You fell asleep in the middle of the third  _Halloween_."

"Oh yeah. Ash got so scared she cried, right?"

"Bingo. I found the journal in your dresser, and-"

"What were you doing in my dresser?"

"I needed to borrow some pants. I think I spilled ketchup on mine or something."

"Yeah, okay, that's something you'd do. Continue."

"So, I found the journal in your dresser, and I figured 'what the hell, I've got nothing to lose by reading this,' and it lined up  _exactly_ with that story you told me about my dad being an alien, right down to my aunt Evelyn. He told me once when I was a kid that he'd had a sister who disappeared under mysterious circumstances, but nothing more than that. And I recognized his handwriting."

"Why didn't you bring it up back then?"

"It was in your underwear drawer, dude. I didn't need you to know I'd been rummaging through there."

"Jesus, Lar." Sal smiled and folded his arms, using them as a pillow on his knees. "You're so fuckin' dumb."

"We're both pretty fuckin' dumb, Sal."

"That's true." Sal drummed his fingers lazily against his other arm for a moment. "You mean it?"

"Of course not; you  _enjoyed physics._  You're a certified nerd."

"No, not that. I meant about us hanging out. Y'know, after. I don't . . ." He sighed. "I don't wanna go it alone."

Larry sighed through his nose and reached for his friend's shoulder. His hand phased through, so he settled for resting it in his foot. "You're not gonna," he assured him. "I'll be right there, if that's what you want. I don't care if your eyeball pops out or you shit yourself-"

"Augh,  _dude_."

"-You're my best friend. Have been for years. Nothing's ever gonna change that. And if you want me there when you die so the first thing you see as a dead man is my handsome face-"

"I never said that."

"-then, fuck, dude, I'm gonna be right there beside you. Promise."

Sal wiped his eyes on one of the sleeves of his jumpsuit. "I wish I could hug you again," he laughed. 

"You will, Sally Face. And I'll hug you right back."


End file.
